Ignorance and the Pursuit of Knowledge / The Pain of the Mark

It was just an extra pair of bowls and chopsticks; in no time at all, Lin brought out two plates of home-style dishes, filled them with rice, and placed them on the table.

"Hmm... actually, if you look closely, you're about the same age as me, but your demeanor makes you seem like a middle-aged man." Anna rested her chubby cheeks on her hands, watching Lin silently pick up his chopsticks. "By the way, you're a student too, aren't you? Which school do you go to?"

"Chienyu Academy".

"Isn't that the same school I go to?"

Lin chewed a couple of mouthfuls of rice.

He is usually very low-key, so it's perfectly normal not to know him.

Anna picked up her chopsticks and took a couple of bites, her eyes sparkling. "Delicious! Uncle, you're such a great cook! And I saw you had a violin at home earlier, do you play the violin?"

"Meeting."

"What a good man."

Lin didn't quite understand the connection between being able to play the violin and being a good man. He was not only good at playing the violin, but also at a performance level in most musical instruments. When he had too much free time, he would learn all sorts of things, and music was just one of them.

Anna finished her meal in no time. Unlike other girls who are reserved while eating, she excitedly asked Lin, who was still eating quietly, with rice grains still on her face, "Uncle, do you have a girlfriend?"

Why are you suddenly asking this?

Lin shook his head. He had almost no contact with people of the same sex, let alone people of the opposite sex.

Anna's joy was palpable. "Then I..."

"Don't want."

Lin put down his chopsticks and bowl.

Anna's joy froze at that moment.

Why?

Lin wiped his mouth and answered coldly—

"Don't want."

Lin had decided on his life path from the time he was old enough to understand the world, to treat it with indifference.

For some reason, he will make contact with people, but he will not have deep relationships with them, let alone develop interpersonal relationships.

So when he groggily woke up from his coma and saw Anna's smiling, mischievous face close to his, he didn't understand what had happened.

"You..." Lin Yi began to speak, but then felt a sharp pain in the back of his head. The person in front of him appeared as a double image, and he immediately realized that he had been hit hard on the head.

"Mmm..." Warm skin pressed against Lin's hand. Anna's large wizard robe was slowly lifted up at this moment, and Lin saw that her chest and lower body were simply wrapped with bandages, which would fall off with a simple tug. What was left was the girl's fair and soft skin.

He asked, feeling dizzy, "Why..."

"Isn't this what you taught me? To maintain absolute control and not let the prey have any power to resist." Anna's warm, winter-sunny smile was gone, replaced by a slightly morbid and eerie one. "Uncle, you've been so manipulating other people's hearts, yet you so decisively refuse to become my family."

"You know what? Yesterday when I got home, I buried my head in the blanket and couldn't sleep because I was so excited. I kept thinking about how handsome you were when you saved me, Uncle. You were as cold as a block of ice that would never melt, and it made me want to wrap your tongue around your mouth and melt you with my body heat..."

The flush on her face contrasted sharply with her fair skin, her body temperature rose steadily, and she reached her hand to her smooth back, gently pulling at the bandage wrapped around her chest...

Lin watched as the bandages slowly came off, his eyes widening as he struggled to escape, but his hands and feet were bound by something. "Let me go."

"No way~ It's Halloween today, trick or treat! Uncle, you didn't give me any candy~ But I'll get some candy soon, and then I can 'trick' too~" Anna licked her lips with her long, thin, bright red tongue and gently stroked Lin's cheek. "Uncle, your ponytail is so pretty. When you're happy later, it will definitely swing in a beautiful arc."

So that's why she was staring at his ponytail back then—

On a snow-covered Halloween, the large witch's robe concealed the girl's figure and Lin's clenched teeth.

Then, a soft, seductive moan escaped from within the heaving black robe...

"Anna, you've come to church again today."

"Hehe, I've been very devout lately, Binai."

The girl wearing a beret waved to Binai as she walked out of the church, and Binai nodded with a mixture of relief and confusion.

Thankfully, Anna hasn't acted impulsively since Halloween, and she often comes to church to pray quietly, proving herself to be a good girl.

Strangely, Binai always felt that when she passed Anna, she could smell a strange odor on her. The smell became stronger after Anna came out of the church. Her face would also be flushed for some unknown reason, and her clothes were always a little messy. Occasionally, some liquid would drip down her stockings and skirt. Anna said that it was milk that she had accidentally spilled on her legs.

Do you spill milk that often?

And on another occasion, when Binai was passing by the church, she thought she heard Anna moaning softly, "Ha~" "Ha~", but when she looked over, she couldn't see Anna.

After much deliberation, Binai decided to give up. She figured she was just overthinking it. She gave a self-deprecating laugh. Anna was such an obedient and good girl; she would never do anything bad.

What Binai didn't know was that after she left, Anna went straight into the church, walked with cheerful steps, and came to the back of the church's statue. She pulled out a hidden door from behind the platform at the base of the statue.

Her lips gradually stretched out unrestrainedly, and her soft tongue licked her lips.

A man, still reeling from the previous pleasure, his eyes rolling back and his body convulsing, was bound to the deepest cross.

"Uncle~ Good day~ I'm here for candy again~"

Deep within her pupils, a beating heart twinkled, just like the star she had seen that day.

Chapter 215 Ignorance and the Pursuit of Knowledge

Humans are ignorant, therefore they are happy.

Humans are driven by a thirst for knowledge, and that is why they suffer.

The atmosphere of the meeting was as if it had fallen into an icy land; no one spoke first, and everyone kept their heads down in a gloomy mood.

The reason is both simple and complex.

"MSA-079".

One of them slowly uttered the number, and the expressions of the others tightened.

"Didn't his Hypervariable Surgery fail? Can someone explain to me how he was able to accurately locate the various bases of KY Plan over the past few months, and then destroy the facilities under the siege of at least thirty Flame-Chaser and countless mechs? And the number of Flame-Chaser he severely injured is approaching three digits."

"..."

No one can answer that.

How can the failure of a project lead to the success of the project being completely outmatched?

The other person slowly uttered a sentence: "Some of us have betrayed us."

"..."

This is something they have no doubt about, but it's something they don't want to face.

If it happened once, that would be one thing, but the fact that Lin was able to locate the base so accurately every time meant that someone who fully understood the plan was giving Lin information, and even enabling him to time his attacks precisely. Otherwise, the losses wouldn't have been so severe.

Betray?

In parliament, someone curled their lip in disdain.

"Speaking of which, I heard Hen say at the banquet that Lin's type is someone like Mobius." Vill-V crunched on potato chips, her toes tapping on the keyboard as she worked rapidly. "Could it be that Lin likes the suffocating pleasure of a long tongue in a deep kiss that can reach down to the throat? I've heard of people being obsessed with that feeling..."

"... As far as I know, Lin has never kissed Doctor Mobius," Prometheus was serving tea and water, replied in a mechanical tone.

"I know, I don't have it either."

Delta, who was playing arcade games nearby, overheard their conversation and her lips twitched.

Over the past few months, she didn't know what Lin had done. All she knew was that her room had become an XP exchange conference, where she could hear Vill-V studying Lin's fetishes from multiple angles every day, and then putting them into practice when Lin came back.

However, Lin Cong never accepted it. Every day he would return here with a heavy heart, stare blankly at his notebook, and occasionally look out the window in deep thought.

Each time, Delta sensed something deepening within him, something she couldn't quite put her finger on, but it was definitely something bad.

Vill-V could also see it, but she never asked Lin what had happened. She was focused on creating the Divine Key and... how to develop Lin's XP.

Even the atmosphere in the Branch 10 was a bit off. More and more people were coming from headquarters, and every now and then you could see a few unfamiliar people walking around the branch, as if they were looking for something or looking at something.

Even though there has only been one Honkai in the past two years, I feel the pressure above my head is getting heavier and heavier, and this pressure is not coming from the outside.

She would always clench her fists when Lin returned, his eyes gradually darkening.

Even though Delta couldn't be sure at first, she now understood, without being told, that there was a problem with the Fire Moth, and that Lin wanted to solve it on his own.

He was after Flame-Chaser like Delta, and even if the Firemoths promised them lies, Lin would turn those lies into reality.

Delta practiced relentlessly, refining her combat skills and tempering her character. She no longer knew whether she was striving for the identity of Flame-Chaser or for something she couldn't quite put her finger on.

"Clatter."

The door was pushed open, and Lin, dressed in tattered clothes, walked in. Delta's heart tightened.

He looked like he'd been attacked more than the day before, his body and helmet were all badly damaged, but Delta was somewhat relieved that Lin was rarely injured; his equipment might be damaged, but he would never come back battered and bruised.

"You're back?" Delta asked, just like yesterday.

"Um."

Lin nodded, went inside, threw himself into a corner, took off his helmet, rubbed his temples, and closed his eyes to rest.

Her hair, three-quarters of which had turned silver-white, stood out conspicuously in the room.

"How was today?" Delta asked tentatively.

"... It's alright." Lin replied, but his face couldn't hide his fatigue. He didn't feel much, but mental exhaustion couldn't be masked by physical numbness.

Lin has been using the Gray Serpent to search for and sabotage the KY Plan's base for a long time. He always manages to find the right opportunity, and ordinary Flame-Chaser cannot stop him.

If Kolin destroys one mech, two more will appear; if he severely injures one Flame-Chaser, three more Flame-Chaser will appear who want to kill him.

He did delay the High Council's progress, but that was all.

There will come a day when the High Council will announce in a high-profile manner that everything about the Firemoth has officially become their property. Before the Honkai strikes, the mechs and Flame-Chaser will suppress all voices.

After that, they might face the Honkai more easily, but whether the main enemy will still be the Honkai remains an open question.

It was late at night and all was quiet.

The man looked at the report in his hand, rubbed the bridge of his nose, and asked the person in front of him, "Isn't it good enough?"

"You know it's very difficult for me to take over everything by myself; the preparation required is more than you can imagine."

The man frowned, but quickly relaxed his grip, letting out a sigh, "I understand."

"They've been making more and more frequent moves lately, so it's better if we meet with them less often."

"...I know."

After the brief conversation, the man left the room, his brow furrowed with lingering worry. He clutched the necklace containing the photograph in his hand and leaned against the wall.

Lin, what are you doing right now?

He looked at the photos of his wife and daughter, and the anxiety in his eyes lessened slightly.

"Despair."

"Who?"

The man cautiously picked up his weapon and looked into the depths of the corridor, where it was completely dark.

He couldn't possibly be wrong.

The man put the photo away in his pocket, then stared intently into the darkness, where someone was approaching.

In the pure white moonlight, the man's pupils shrank as the newcomer appeared. He was surprised that this person would appear in this place at this time, and in front of him.

"Forest..."

The man wearing a helmet walked out empty-handed, stood in the moonlight, and calmly met his gaze.

"Hen, I have something to tell you."

This "traitor" is standing right here, completely open and aboveboard.

Upon hearing this, the man breathed a sigh of relief and laughed heartily, "Mm."

Chapter 216 The Pain of the Scar

Something was wriggling filth in the darkness, and with each step on the floor, I could feel the greasy, slippery substance sliding under my feet.

The appearance of the person in front of me kept changing in the darkness due to my colorblind vision. One moment it was a man with a cold and sarcastic smirk, and the next it was a girl with her head tilted and smiling, like a piece of clay that could be kneaded at will.